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Jesus and the Woman caught in adultery. Ravenna, Sant’Apollinare Nuovo, 6th C. Photo: Andras.handl.hu
The Demon of Impurity
Every priest has to periodically answer the same question (usually coming from young people): “Why are bodily, carnal relations between men and women outside of marriage considered a sin? If it’s done by mutual consent, no harm is done to anyone. Fornication is another thing—that’s betrayal, the destruction of a family. But what’s so bad about this?”
To start with, let’s remember what sin is. Sin is the transgression of the law (1 Jn. 3:4). That is, a violation of the laws of the spiritual life. Violations of both physical and spiritual laws lead to trouble, to self-destruction. It’s impossible to build anything good on sin, on a mistake. If a serious engineering miscalculation is made when laying the foundation of a house, the house won’t stand long. There was a house built like this in the village where we have our dacha and it collapsed within a year.
Holy Scripture calls sexual relations outside of marriage fornication and classifies them among the most serious of sins: Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind … shall inherit the Kingdom of God (1 Cor. 6:9–10). They won’t inherit it unless they repent and stop committing fornication. For those who have fallen into fornication, the Church’s canonical rules, such as those from St. Basil the Great and St. Gregory of Nyssa, are also very strict, forbidding them to commune until they repent and fulfill a penance. I won’t say anything about the length of the penances. Modern man simply can’t endure it.
Why is the Church so strict about the sin of fornication and what’s the danger of this sin?
It must be said that carnal, intimate communion between a man and woman has never been forbidden by the Church, but on the contrary is even blessed, but only in one case—within the marital union. And by the way, this includes those in a civil marriage. After all, in the first few centuries of Christianity, there was a problem when one spouse accepted Christianity but the other hadn’t yet. The Apostle Paul didn’t allow such spouses to divorce, recognizing that this was also a marriage, even if without the blessing of the Church for now.1
The same Apostle writes about marital bodily relations: Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence: and likewise also the wife unto the husband. The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband: and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife. Defraud ye not one the other, except it be with consent for a time, that ye may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again, that Satan tempt you not for your incontinency (1 Cor. 7:3–5).
The Lord blessed the marital union and blessed the physical communion within it, which serves for procreation. The husband and wife are no longer two, but one flesh (Gen. 2:24). Marriage is another (albeit not the most important) difference between us and animals. The beasts have no marriage. A female animal can copulate with any male, even with her own children when they grow up. But humans have marriage—mutual responsibility and duties before one another and their children.
Physical relations are a very intense experience and they serve for greater attachment between the spouses. Thy desire shall be to thy husband (Gen. 3:16) is said about the wife, and this mutual attraction between spouses also helps to strengthen their union.
But that which is blessed within marriage is a sin, a violation of the commandments if committed outside of marriage. The marital union unites a man and woman into one flesh (Eph. 5:31) for mutual love and the birthing and raising of children. But the Bible also tells us that in fornication, people also unite into “one flesh,” but only in sin and lawlessness—for sinful pleasure and irresponsibility: Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid. What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? (1 Cor. 6:15–16).
Indeed, every lawless carnal relation causes a deep wound to a man’s soul and body, and when he wants to get married, it will be very hard for him to carry this burden and the memory of past sins.
Fornication unites people, but to the defilement of their bodies and souls.
Love between a man and woman is possible only within marriage, where people give oaths of fidelity and mutual responsibility before God and all men. Neither just having sexual relations nor cohabitating with one partner in the now fashionable common law marriage bring a man true happiness. Because marriage isn’t just physical intimacy, but also spiritual unity, love, and trust in your loved one. It’s clear that neither promiscuous relations nor cohabitation can give this. No matter what beautiful words lovers of common law marriage may hide behind, one thing lies at the foundation of their relationship—mutual distrust, uncertainty in their feelings, fear of losing their “freedom.” People who fornicate rob themselves; instead of following an open, blessed path, they try to sneak happiness in through the back door. One priest, very experienced in family life, once said that those living outside of marriage are like people who dare to put on priestly vestments and serve the Liturgy—they want to receive something that doesn’t rightfully belong to them.
Statistics show that couples that had a period of cohabitation before they got marriage break up far more often than spouses who did not. And this is understandable: You can’t have sin at the foundation of a family edifice. Of course, the physical relations of spouses are given to them as a reward for their patience and purity. Young people who don’t save themselves for marriage are lax, weak-willed people. If they didn’t deny themselves anything before marriage, then they’ll just as easily and freely cheat on their spouse.
